Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/832

 RALPH WALDO EMERSON

Such 'twill reward; They shall return More than they were, And ever ascending.

Leave all for love;

Yet, hear me, yet,

One word more thy heart behoved,

One pulse more of firm endeavour

Keep thee to-day,

To-morrow," for ever,

Free as an Arab

Of thy beloved.

Cling with life to the maid;

But when the surprise,

First vague shadow of surmise,

Flits across her bobom young,

Of a joy apart from thee,

Free be she, fancy-free;

Nor thou detain her vesture's hem,

Nor the palest rose she flung

From her summer diadem.

Though thou loved her as thyself, As a self of purer clay; Though her parting dims the day, Stealing grace from all alive; Heartily know, When half -gods go The gods arrive.

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